Index.php does not open up

[Jofio]

Hello,

I am a newbie in PHP and I am enthusiastically trying out things. I've
just replaced my

index.html (

file with

index.php

with of course a few lines of php code, which I am sure they are all
correct as far as the syntax goes. I expect the file (index.php) to be
loaded in to the browser window upon launching the browser. It's not
doing that; instead, it loads the apache index file. (Oh, I forgot...
I am running php 5 and apache 2.xxx and modified idex.html to
indexHtml.html to avoid the webserver serving the page). I guess that I
need to insert a line somewhere in the apache config file but I don't
how...

Any help, please.

jofio

[Andrew DeFaria]

Jofio wrote:

Hello,

I am a newbie in PHP and I am enthusiastically trying out things. I've
just replaced my

index.html (

file with

index.php

with of course a few lines of php code, which I am sure they are all
correct as far as the syntax goes. I expect the file (index.php) to be
loaded in to the browser window upon launching the browser. It's not
doing that; instead, it loads the apache index file. (Oh, I forgot...
I am running php 5 and apache 2.xxx and modified idex.html to
indexHtml.html to avoid the webserver serving the page).
Huh? Do you mean that you renamed the current index.html ->
indexHtml.html? OK, where's your index.html page now?
I guess that I need to insert a line somewhere in the apache config
file but I don't how...

Any help, please.

First make sure that your index.php page really does work by specifying
it completely. IOW, if your index.php page is at your DocumentRoot then
specify http://<myserver>/index.php. See if that works.

There's no real magic here. Apache, and other web servers for that
matter, is configured to open up a default file if none is specified.
Traditionally that's index.html but more defaults have crept in.

I'm running Apache 2 on Linux. Adjust for your OS. On my OS the
configuration files are under /etc/httpd/conf (some OSes use
/etc/apache/conf or /etc/apache2/conf). Additionally Apache has several
configuration files. A simple grep yeilds me:

$ grep index.php *.conf
commonhttpd.conf: DirectoryIndex index.html index.html.var index.php
index.php3 index.shtml index.cgi index.pl index.htm Default.htm default.htm

So then, it's in the commonhttpd.conf file in /etc/httpd/conf for me.
The parameter is called DirectoryIndex. What follows is the list of
files that Apache will look for when you specify a URL that points to a
directory instead of a file. In my case it's index.html followed by
index.html.var (I believe the .var files are an Apache 2 convention for
multiple languages. I don't use them so I haven't investigated them
further) then index.php (Viola!), index.php3 (old - I probably could get
rid of this), index.shtml (shtml are for server parsed files. I played
with that once), index.cgi (IOW any index.cgi but generally I name my
Perl scripts .cgi), index.pl (again, for Perl), index.htm (old MS
heritage 3 character extensions, which, BTW, Win95 and above can do more
than 3 character extensions) Default.htm and default.htm (Yuck! IIS
influenced names!).

So then just stick the index.php in the list of DirectoryIndex files in
whatever order of importance you see fit (When Apache searches for a
DirectoryIndex first one found wins!) and restart Apache. For exmaple,
given my configuration above if I had an index.html it would be server
first before index.php. That's OK for me because if I consciously
rewrite an index.html to be dynamic making it an index.php I am
replacing the index.html so I'd simply remove it.

--
I used to work at a factory where they made hydrants; but you couldn't
park anywhere near the place.

[Jofio]

I have renamed index.html to indexHtml.html so to avoid the browser
from opening the file by default at the launching of a browser. Instead
I want wanted the index.php to open up by default....

and oh yes, typing http://localhost/index.php does open the page.
However, problem is it doesn't open up by default as it should like
index.html.

Win XP pro is my OS.

I've just uppended index.php in the DirectoryIndex line in the
apache's httpd config file as shown below
DirectoryIndex index.html index.php index.html.var

.....don't seem to see any difference.
But nevertheless, thanks alot.
jofio

[Andrew DeFaria]

Jofio wrote:

I have renamed index.html to indexHtml.html so to avoid the browser
from opening the file by default at the launching of a browser.
Instead I want wanted the index.php to open up by default....
What a browser opens as a default page is a function of what you tell
the browser to open as a default - not a function of the web server! My
default "home" page is set to http://defaria.com on the browser I run at
home - Firefox. At work it's set to http://news.google.com. Notice none
of these involve localhost!
and oh yes, typing http://localhost/index.php does open the page.
However, problem is it doesn't open up by default as it should like
index.html.
You could always set your default home page to
http://localhost/index.php! ;-)

What is your default home page set to in your browser? For that matter
WHAT'S YOUR BROWSER! You neglected to mention that.
Win XP pro is my OS.

I've just uppended index.php in the DirectoryIndex line in the
apache's httpd config file as shown below

DirectoryIndex index.html index.php index.html.var
What's an "uppended"?!? 'Cause I see index.php between index.html and
index.html.var. Is that what "uppended" means? :-)
....don't seem to see any difference.
Did you follow the other advice to restart Apache? Changes to the config
will not go into effect until you do that. Also, is there an index.html
in your DocumentRoot?
But nevertheless, thanks alot.

Again this is not rocket science here. If you specify http://localhost
in the address bar (or configure it for the default page to open for
your browser) then the web server at localhost (default port of 80) will
be contacted. The server will look at what DocumentRoot is set to (for
example, C:\HTDocs). Since you didn't specify an actual file then the
server will search for C:\HTDocs\index.html, because that is what you
listed first in DirectoryIndex. If that file is found it will be
retrieved - end of search. If not then the search continues to
C:\HTDocs\index.php. Assuming you've configured the type for .php files
to run through PHP it will be run through PHP and the resulting file
will be displayed. If C:\HTDocs\index.php is not found then
C:\HTDocs\index.html.var will be use if it is found. Finally, if none
are found then the server will return 404.
--
If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular?